“Okay, mostly fine.”
“I miss sushi, Bean.”
“Yeah, me too.” Lizzie sighs. “That was a really bad couple of days.” After a moment, she perks back up. “But that was years ago, and it’s time to move on and trust the damn process again.”
“I swear to god, if you ruin tacos or mac and cheese or fucking buffalo wings for me, I will never forgive you. Never.” Amelia accentuates her words by pointing an angry finger at Lizzie, but there’s no real heat behind it. She opens the back door and slides into the car, and Lizzie follows her. I take a few seconds to laugh at how ridiculous they are and mentally prepare myself for more time with Amelia. Her citrus lotion fills the small space and makes me think with the wrong head.
When I slip into the car, they’re fighting over what music to listen to next.
I snag Lizzie’s phone out of her hand and scroll through the playlists. “Sleepy Sleep, Bitter Bitch, Vroom Motherfucking Vroom, Dance Like No Assholes Are Watching, Dance Like Your Hot Stalker’s Watching, Clean The Damn House… Who named these things?” I ask with a laugh. I pick the cleaning one, and an upbeat song starts playing.
“That’d be Minnie. She’s had a torrid affair going on with music for a long time. I’d say it’s her one true love, but?—”
“Shut up and drive. We’re starving here,” Amelia interrupts. Lizzie gives her a wicked smirk before backing out of the parking spot, and I wonder just what Lizzie was going to say. Amelia’s sitting as far away from me as she can now, behind Lizzie instead of in the middle of the backseat. She’s facing the window next to her, and it feels like her whole body is curled that way, like she can’t stand to be near me.
I swallow a miserable groan. Just a little over a week ago, we were sitting thigh to thigh in the back of a car after a late night at the office. The nights when we stayed late enough thatAmelia would agree to let me escort her home were my favorites. Are those really gone forever now?
Shame fills me for regretting holding her for even a second. I’m even more ashamed that I voiced that regret as quickly as I felt it instead of processing it first and realizing it was fear. The same fear that had held me back for a year, except multiplied by a million. The fear of losing her after holding her, after kissing her, after being inside her, was so much stronger than it was before that it exploded out, and I didn’t know what the hell to do with it.
I miss her. She’s just a few feet from me, but she’s a thousand miles away.
Chapter 20
Show me the bunnies!
Amelia
God, I fucking miss him. I close my eyes and breathe deep, taking the scent of him into my lungs. That spicy musk I’ve never been able to get enough of. I can’t even lie to myself right now and pretend like I don’t still crave it, like it doesn’t make my knees weak and my panties wet, like it doesn’t make my heart race and my soul settle. I blink back tears at the memories it conjures up. Memories of fixing his ties, of gorgeous smiles and messy hair, of flirty texts…memories of his mouth on my mouth, on my breasts, on my clit… I shake my head and force them away.
He broke your heart. He hurt you. He’s your best friend’s dad. You hate him.
He broke your heart. He hurt you. He’s your best friend’s dad.You hate him.
He broke your heart. He hurt you. He’s your best friend’s dad. You hate him.
If I keep repeating those sentences in my head, maybe I’ll stop wanting him.
Maybe.
I’ve seen the pain in his eyes, and part of me wants to hear him out. But the bigger part of me, the part that still feels raw, wants to hide. Hiding is winning out at the moment. It feels safer than putting my heart in his hands.
The cheerful mood the Danish, coffee, and music kept mein on the way to the falls is nowhere to be found on the way back to town. Apparently, it’s hiding, too. I hope I’m not making the connection between my mood and Alex obvious. Bean has no idea he’s the cause of my misery, and I need to keep it that way. I would hate myself if I ruined her wedding. I’ve been trying to keep Tiffany from doing that for months. I can’t let this…whatever it is…mess up the best day of my best friend’s life, so I have to keep pretending like I’m not in love with her dad and that he didn’t shatter every bit of me with regret and rejection. She’s already angry at him—she just doesn’t realize that it’s him she’s angry with on my behalf.
Fuck, it’s all so complicated. I wish I could just sleep until the wedding. And then disappear. Maybe I’ll look into joining a hippie commune or get a job on a cruise ship.
Bean and Alex chat in the front seat, catching up on each other’s lives.
“I would have come to your college graduation if you’d let me know when it was. I still hate that I missed your high school one because I got sick.”
“I wasn’t going to bother walking last year, but Mom was giving me grief about it, so I changed my mind at the last minute. And come on, Dad. You weren’t just a little sick; you were hospitalized.”
“Still sucks, kiddo.”
“Barry has it on video. He has both, actually. That man lives for filling his phone memory with videos,” Bean assures him. I smile because it’s true. “And Joan, she lives for pictures. You can be sure that between the two of them, almost every single moment of all of our lives has been documented.”
“I’ll have to be sure to thank them both since your mother sure as hell doesn’t do the same. An entire room devoted to pageants and sporting events her kids have won, but not a single school picture or birthday picture on the wallsanywhere,” Alex says, clearly disappointed and disgusted. “I figured she was just being selfish and not sharing them with me. I didn’t realize she wasn’t even bothering to take any.”
I feel stabby when Tiffany is mentioned. Or around. Or breathing. Her trophy room wouldn’t bother me so much if she had any other photos up, but she never has. Bean hated doing those damn pageants so much. I went to them all to support her so she could look out into the crowd and see one person who was proud of her, no matter what.
